Some of the little (and no so little) things can REALLY make a big difference to a game that is verging on great:1. The post-game stats page. You remember when the dragon breathed fire on the congrats page after completing a map and it told you your score, the number of days played and had a monster as a rating. Likewise the hiscore page. With these you could play a map a second time and try to beat your previous score. Nival, please put these back!!
2. The sound effects for map objects. Where's my little Irish Leprechaun jig when I interact with the "Garden of the Wee-folk" ? What happened to the sounds with the other objects? Gone I tell ye! HOMM 2 was the best in this regard with a wide variety of sounds for EVERY single object. The Sphinx was particularly memorable I recall. Nival, please put these back too!
3. The beautiful flora and fauna. In HOMM 2-4 we had lots of brightly coloured flowers and grasses for the grass terrain. Bright bluebells, yellow daises and red roses, little gardens sprinkled here and there all of which made the game really seem alive. Pity that in HOMM 5 we've just got a few red flowers and maybe the occassional blue on (if you look hard enough on the combat map) but they don't hold a candle to the previous games. In fact, the only decoration for the grassland terrain I recall is the pumpkin patch/sunflowers (not counting trees and mountains which are pretty mandatory). Maybe we'll see more in the expansion or a patch...
4. The Flavour text for the artifacts/map objects. This has been mentioned before but I really like to read these, even after I know what most of them are. How hard could it be to put them back? After all, the code is there with the likes of the arena and witch's hut.
5. There was also a little ditty played out when you first entered combat. A short 5 second piece that signalled "Oh no, you've done it now". Best examples were in HOMM 2 and 3. I don't think 4 did it, and sadly 5 doesn't either.
6. Creature banks. You used to get lots of these, dwarven hill mounds that you had to fight to get a reward. Naga banks full of Nagas. Graveyards with ghosts and zombies in them. In HOMM 5 I've found two so far. The crypt and Dragon Utopia. Are there any more? There should be!! Also why not tell me how many creatures are guarding it before I click yes, that way I can judge if my army can beat them or not. Grrr!
These are the things I miss most. Some of them are trivial things but these can really give a game that "cared about" feeling. Come on, Nival, give us back some of the things we miss most...
P.S - Is it just me or are there no unit shadows on the combat map for the underground/swamp section. Plenty on grass terrain...
P.P.S - One more thing, does anyone else get motion sickness from the title page. That camera just will not keep still! I can't bear to look at it sometimes.
P.P.P.S - God this is getting daft now, but why did they make the gems and crystals use the same 3D model on the map (all they did was change the colour for god's sake!) Make the gems multicoloured at the very least!
. The return to the H-III hero hiring is a joke. The computer picks the heroes to select (sorry but I want to choose), and no limits on how many. Now it has not occurred here so I don’t know if it will work, but on more than one occasion I saved a city in H-III by hiring heroes, having them do suicide runs weakening the AI until it was weakened enough to take on with my main army. So let me choose the hero (of course some won’t be made available for storyline reasons) and limit the number I can hire at a city if you must. I know this has been debated, but having creatures show up all on Monday makes no sense at all even to the simple minded. In H-III it made the program code somewhat simpler but that’s not an issue anymore. Though I admit with no caravans running the heroes around would be a continuous never ending cycle of fun. 
To give a graphic overall was necessary to keep the game fresh and competitive as most of us play other games. However to be great it has to take a step forward, I find this game took 1 step forward (the graphics), but two steps back. I am half way through the Necromancer campaign and I am already bored. I did not play at all today, I just could not think of a good reason to start up the game. 
So what does it need:
